How Invasive Plants Fueled an Inferno in Maui

[Botany]

Research by Clay Trauernicht, a fire specialist at the University of Hawaii, and others has shown that the scale and frequency of wildfires have been increasing across in Hawaii from the early 1900s to the 2010s. The researchers also identified a major culprit: non-native plants.

“Wildfires were most frequent in developed areas, but most areas burned occurred in dry non-native grasslands and shrublands that currently compose 24 percent of Hawaii’s total land cover,” the researchers wrote. “These grass-dominated landscapes allow wildfires to propagate rapidly.”

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The non-native grasses were brought to Hawaii by cattle ranchers in the 19th century, University of California Santa Barbara ecologist Carla D’Antonio told me. “They were selected because they were drought tolerant.”

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The grasses are an especially potent fuel, D'Antonio explained, because they grow quickly when it rains and then stick around, deeply rooted into the soil, as dry, dead organic matter, becoming a “standing layer of very ignitable fuel.”

https://heatmap.news/climate/how-invasive-plants-fueled-an-inferno-in-maui

Please everybody out there no matter where you live when you plant plant a native. This is one of the most important
things you can do.

[crickets]

1. K&R for visibility.

[DFW]

2. We saw this all over the Parker Ranch on the Big Island

The non-native grass was planted for the grazing goats, which are now everywhere. The naturalists there were well aware of the invasive species as a problem, but all felt it had spread too far to be something they could eradicate. Now the bill becomes due.

[Botany]

3. For everybody who complains about round up my question is how do control the non native invassives?

All over the world control of non natives is critical and will take generations.



Invasive flowering pear trees in spring.

[StarryNite]

4. Non-native plants to feed non-native cattle

From the article...

"The non-native grasses were brought to Hawaii by cattle ranchers in the 19th century, University of California Santa Barbara ecologist Carla D’Antonio told me. “They were selected because they were drought tolerant.”

They are also invasive. The abandoned sugar and pineapple farms across the state are quickly taken over by non-native grasses. “When the land gets abandoned, the grasses are the first invaders. All you need is a little drought to have a flammable landscape.” Maui is currently in a drought."